


It Rains

by MoominQuartz (IceCreAMS)



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Gem Fusion, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Know Your Fusion, Late Night Conversations, Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-02
Updated: 2020-01-02
Packaged: 2021-02-25 02:53:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22088845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IceCreAMS/pseuds/MoominQuartz
Summary: Connie is woken by the short, simple melody of her text tone. The fact that Connie still only has one number in her phone outside of her immediate family means that the text can only be from one person.
Relationships: Amethyst & Steven Universe, Connie Maheswaran & Steven Universe, Connie Maheswaran/Steven Universe
Comments: 32
Kudos: 231





	It Rains

**Author's Note:**

  * For [KrisseyCrystal (IceCreAMS)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/IceCreAMS/gifts).



> Written for my beautiful wife as part of her holiday gift, who requested a Connverse hurt/comfort fic with Steven the one hurting. I would've posted it sooner, but we're on vacation and getting wifi has been... a struggle to say the least. This takes place immediately following the episode "Know Your Fusion" from season 4. I hope you guys like it!

Connie is woken by the short, simple melody of her text tone. 

It isn’t the sort of thing that happens frequently. Her house is always quiet and still after her parents go to bed. And Connie has always been a light sleeper, especially lately, especially with the nightmares.

The fact that Connie still only has one number in her phone outside of her immediate family means that the text can only be from one person. That makes her sit upright, grabbing it from the end table, peering at the bright light of the phone.

_ hey uh… can i come in? it’s cool if you’re asleep _

“Come in?”

She walks to her window to peer through the blinds and is completely blindsided by a pink lion parked out on the street.

She dials.

_ “Hey, Connie.” _

“Steven,” she hisses, hoping her parents are not nearly as light a sleeper as she is. She has never needed to test that before today. “What are you doing here? It’s past midnight! You’re gonna get in trouble! What did you tell the Gems?”

_ “Yeah. Um…”  _ She freezes when she hears a tell-tale sniff.  _ “Uh, okay. I’ll just—” _

“No no no,” she backtracks. “I’m sorry. I’ll head down. Just… just be quiet, okay?”

She’s silent as she makes her way down the stairs, leaving her door open so she doesn’t risk waking anyone. Her training with Pearl has made her steps lighter, careful to hold her center of gravity higher. She double-checks that the alarm is off — the beeps it makes as it disarms send anxiety spiking down her back, but she hears no sounds from upstairs — before she finally opens the door to let him in.

The air is brisk, reminding them that winter is just around the corner. In her pajama dress, she nearly freezes, and then she sees that Steven is in his pajamas, too. The yellow ones he loves so much. His eyes and nose are red from crying.

“H-hey, Connie,” he sniffs as he comes inside. His voice is a low whisper, which is impressive for a boy who is not usually aware of his volume. “Um, sorry for just…”

“Don’t apologize.” Connie shuts the door and immediately takes his hand in hers. “Uh, let’s sit. In the living room. Are you okay?”

Steven sniffs again. He nods. Then he shakes his head. He groans and, as they reach the couch, he flops down onto it belly-down. “I don’t know,” he mutters, shoving his face into his arms. “I don’t  _ know.” _

Connie hesitates, watching him. Steven has never been inarticulate about his emotions. If anything, he’s perhaps the most emotionally intelligent person she’s ever met; the ability to give voice to the things he’s feeling, and the ability to do so with the kind of care that won’t hurt someone else… that’s always been one of his strongest points, one of the many things she admires him for.

“Okay,” Connie says with a nod, sitting down next to him. “Okay. So… let me just ask. What happened?” _Why are you here this late?_

He rubs at his eyes. “I-I was… I was trying to sleep. I guess I couldn’t. I just felt all… twisted.”

‘Twisted’ is a good word. But it’s not one that’s characteristic for Steven. Outside of his mother, Steven’s emotions are all fairly straightforward, clear-cut. 

“Was it about anything in particular?” Because surely he wouldn’t be distressed enough to seek her out in the middle of the night over something like ‘feeling twisted.’

Steven shifts so that he’s on his back, looking up at the ceiling, and sets his head in Connie’s lap. Such casual affection makes her heart twist for him. “I’m not sure if I’m supposed to talk about this,” he says finally. “The rules for fusion are weird. I don’t know if I should talk about it without Amethyst.”

Connie blinks, struggling to catch up. “Uh… Were you trying to sleep as Smoky Quartz?” Steven’s enthusiasm for his first gem fusion had been infectious. Amidst all the other horrible things that happened — Jasper choosing corruption over help, the big revelation about Rose Quartz shattering Pink Diamond, being shot into space all on his own, nearly being killed by the Ruby with her gem on her eye… well, Smoky Quartz had sounded, to Connie, like Steven’s silver lining.

But Steven shakes his head. “No, it’s…” He gives another sigh. At least his eyes aren’t watering anymore. “Amethyst and I planned out this huge thing to reveal Smoky Quartz to Garnet and Pearl. We were really tight-lipped about it until we could actually  _ introduce  _ them. But it kind of… went wrong? And at the same time, it turned out okay.”

“Okay.”

“But…” Steven’s voice hiccups. “I-I dunno. Garnet and Pearl fused into Sardonyx, and she kept talking about this… this ‘trick’ that Smoky needed. Like they had an ace up their sleeve that they didn’t know they had. That Smoky couldn’t  _ find. _ And — I mean, I  _ was  _ Smoky, but I wasn’t, and…”

“I know how it feels to be a fusion, Steven,” Connie reminds gently. And then — because she knows exactly what Steven needs right now, and it isn’t something she probably would want, but this is  _ Steven — _ she makes a daring move, and brushes her fingers across his cheek to wipe away the tear tracks.

Immediately the waterworks return. “Smoky got all…  _ twisted.  _ But it wasn’t the kind of twisted Stevonnie got at the rave, or when Stevonnie was racing Kevin. We weren’t breaking apart, but it was like… we were breaking down together.”

He presses his cheek into her hand, curling into her, and her heart jumps into her throat.

“It was like—” Steven’s hands fist. “We wanted to do everything Sardonyx said. We wanted to  _ be  _ everything Sardonyx said! But the more and more we realized we were a one-trick pony, that Sardonyx had all these expectations and they were  _ nothing  _ we could live up to, I just —  _ we  _ just —”

Steven shudders. Connie wants to tug him upright and properly hold him, but Steven has absolutely no qualms about hugging when he wants, holding when he wants. He will when he’s ready. “‘Two wrongs don’t make a right.’ Smoky said that.  _ I  _ said that. About  _ us!  _ About Amethyst and me! And I’ve never — I’ve never felt like  _ that,  _ never that  _ intensely _ …”

“Self-loathing,” Connie clarifies, stunned. 

Steven hiccups again, tears pooling in the space between her finger and his cheek. He pushes himself upright in order to wipe his eyes and Connie misses the contact fiercely, but it is brief; in the next breath, he’s pushed against her, his head against her shoulder and his arm entangling with hers. 

“So even though we all kinda… talked it out, and Smoky ended up showing off some cool moves that proved we were cool, I guess, it stuck with me. That feeling of just…  _ never  _ being enough. I guess. Maybe it wasn’t fair to Amethyst, because I’ve felt that before and I should’ve tried not to let feel like that so that she wouldn’t have to. And then I was trying to sleep, but I kept thinking about that moment, over and over, and then I started  _ feeling  _ it again, and… and I didn’t want Amethyst to know I was messed up about something that happened during  _ our  _ fusion, and I couldn’t just tell Garnet or Pearl that something  _ they’d  _ done as Sardonyx had messed with me, so I…”

“Oh, Steven,” Connie murmurs, setting her chin on top of his head. He sniffs in response.

What does she say? Could she count the ways he amazed her? Steven might as well have hung the stars in the sky, for how important he is to her. He had utterly changed every facet of her life in the simplest of ways: 

He decided to be her friend. 

“I get it,” she begins. “I mean, I… I never had a moment like that as Stevonnie, but. The self-loathing thing? You’re definitely not alone. I think it’s way more normal than it probably should be. I used to  _ hate  _ myself; I was always so weak, and so shy, and such a wallflower, and I was  _ such  _ a crybaby—”

“W-what?” Steven shifts, pulling just far enough away so that he can look her in the eye, and his expression is one of horror. “But  _ Connie!  _ You’re  _ none  _ of those things! Well, maybe you’re still a bit shy, but that’s not a  _ bad  _ thing!  _ None  _ of those are bad things!”

“I know that  _ now,”  _ Connie replies, sliding her hand down his arm in order to intertwine their fingers. “But before I met you, Steven — all of what I just said, combined with feeling forced to obey my parents’ every rule… I was suffocated. I hated it. And I wish I could’ve been there to tell you that you’re okay.”

Steven’s eyes follow the movements of her hand. Connie flushes, wondering if that was maybe the wrong choice, but Steven gives her a gentle squeeze in reassurance. “You can tell me now,” he murmurs, voice almost breaking.

Connie pulls him back in to her, enfolding him in her arms. “Steven Universe,” she says, soft and gentle. “You’re okay. Even if you never become the things everyone wants you to be…” There is something unsaid here; a comparison to his mother, whom Connie has come to dislike, for the weight she left on her son’s shoulders. “Even if you never become the things  _ you  _ want to be. You’re okay. You’re more than enough.”

Steven trembles as he wraps his arms around her in turn, face pressing into the corner of her neck and shoulder. He cries and she holds him, and it is only the two of them in the stillness of her house.

Outside, as the sun begins to rise, it rains.


End file.
